He removes the spectacles.
My open palm catches him square on the cheek. The slap reverberates around the room, sounding much harder than it actually was. A patch of red rises satisfyingly on his skin and I bunch my fists and hug myself, instantly ashamed.
‘Well done,’ he says dryly. ‘I hope that did the trick.’
‘Not really. This is what we’re going to do.’
I hop off the bed and take myself to lean against a large, highly polished desk, big enough to hold a conference around.
‘Here I am, Chase, naked and available. We’re in your office and this is your desk. Come and do what you would have done, if it had ever been possible. Not what you did in your fantasies – what you actually would have done, in real life. I need to know.’
He spends some time just watching me from the bed, as if weighing up options. I lean back, flex my legs, perform a numbe
r of standard come-hither moves, but he responds to none of them.
Perhaps I should leave now. I don’t even care about failure any more.
But then he is on his feet in a flash, bending me backwards over the table, more by the force of his presence than anything corporeal and I am looking up into eyes that gleam with determination.
‘Have you any idea how long I’ve waited for this?’
I shake my head, holding my breath until it hurts.
He puts a hand on my cheek, cupping it, pressing his thumb into the soft skin beneath my chin. One finger strokes me beneath my ear lobe. It is almost too sensual to bear and the phrase ‘I am undone’ flits through my mind. If I had a bodice on, I think he would be about to rip it.
His lips hover about mine, as if undecided whether to kiss me or bite me. Eventually, they find a third way, opening to emit speech.
‘Years,’ he whispers. ‘So many years of having you within my reach, and never being able to touch you. Knowing that you wanted me to, knowing that I couldn’t. Can you imagine what that does to a man?’
‘Roughly the same as it does to a woman, maybe. I should know.’
The cloth of his jacket nudges my breasts, tormenting my nipples with little blasts of sensation. His crotch, hard and protuberant, fits snugly into the yielding delta between my thighs.
This is how it could have been.
His lips have done with talking. They fit themselves to mine, over mine, holding my mouth briefly shut before descending into frenzy. We devour each other, teeth, tongues, arms, hands, legs. He jolts me against the table until my back aches and then he lifts me on to it so I sit with my legs locked around his hips, pushing my hand down to his imprisoned cock, giving it a hard squeeze.
He kisses exactly the way I thought he would, passionate and yet controlled, with not a hint of vulnerability or uncertainty. He knows what he wants and he gets it. Everything I saw in him, everything that turned me on about him, is distilled into this huge Eve’s apple of a kiss. Here he is, the tree of knowledge in human form, and I am no better than those poor saps in the Bible.
Does that make Lloyd the serpent?
The thought of Lloyd throws me off my stride. A wave of discomfort at the idea of him seeing this washes over me like cold water.
I make a weak attempt to pull away from Chase, but he won’t have it, putting a hand on my ribs and laying me flat on the table while he suffocates me with the intensity of his kiss.
You wanted this, Lloyd. I’m doing it. I hope it makes you happy.
He starts to bite and I try to protest, but without knowing why or how, I find myself enjoying it, the way I used to enjoy play fights with my cousins as a child. Adrenalin pumps and I find new reserves of spirit and strength, using them to bite back, to growl, to push and kick.
His force is superior, of course, and his hands are everywhere, all over me, all at once, and they are none too gentle either.
When he breaks the kiss, I shout, ‘I hate you, you fucker!’ and he laughs loudly and sinks his teeth into my neck.
I use my pelvis as a weapon, jerking it upwards, trying to grind him to pieces, but he enjoys this, and enjoys subduing me and pinning me down even more.
By the time his hand reaches my pussy, ready to take it as his right, I am helpless.
‘Tell me you want it,’ he growls, his fingertips primed and poised. ‘Go on. Tell me or I’ll stop right here.’